Ruins
by Alicamel
Summary: Can things ever go back to the way they used to be?


Ruins, PG   
by Alice R. aka Alicamel  
  
I collect numbers. Some people collect stamps, or dolls, or little glass ornaments. I collect phone numbers, the random numbers of assorted woman that I've never dialled. But somehow I feel I have to keep them, bound up in an elastic band like trading cards, in my top chest drawer. What would I trade them for?  
  
They are there, all day, all night, all the time when she could open the drawer and see them. But she never opens the drawer, and I never expect her too.   
  
And still I leave them there, like a phone directory of all my mistakes and wonderings. And almost every night I come back with a handful more. Some have names on, though most don't. Julie, Becky, Rachel. Faceless woman.   
  
Tonight I picked a bar in the next town over. Justine's, I think it was called, though it could have been anywhere. A dark smoky bar, full of dark sultry music and blank faces. A place where anything and everything could happen. Lots of dark corners, an alley outside. A million and one places to live out the cliché. And I lived it.   
  
I'm so tired.   
  
I drive home and deposit four more numbers into my collection. She pretends to be sleep, and I pretend that she is.   
  
I'm so tired.   
  
How long before she wakes up?   
  
--   
  
She stands on the edge of the dock, the old wooden planks squeaking quietly beneath her blue sketchers. The boat isn't docked.   
  
She stands at the edge, looking over to the lake water. He told her that he dreamed of teaching their girls to swim here, and sail on his boat.   
  
His boat isn't docked.   
  
She stands still, as if frozen, watching the waters wash back and forth, occasional hitting harder when a larger boat sails by.   
  
She looks down, down, down, wondering how far down the bottom is, what is there, and how quickly she'd sink, if she slipped and fell.   
  
She sees him sailing home. She takes a step back and stands. Waiting for him.   
  
--   
  
Does she honestly not know? We sit for breakfast, looking out over the lake. She smiles at me as she pours herself a glass of milk. I drink coffee, black, burning hot. We sit opposite each other, but not looking at each other.   
  
In the middle of the table is a collection of giant daises she must have picked this morning. She was gone when I woke up; maybe she didn't sleep well.   
  
"Did you sleep well?"   
  
"Yes, thank you." She smiles blankly and clears the table. I look back out the window.  
  
--  
  
He is gone, off to work, leaving me alone. I tidy the spotless house, put the washing on, make a shopping list. And then, determined, head outside, clutching the list, under the pretence of shopping, even though the cupboards are full and the fridge is bursting. There are still things we don't have.   
  
I take the footpath round the lake until I find it. It borders the lake, which seems silly, because the earth must be sodden and a nightmare to dig. I imagine the wood rots underneath. But no one ever looks at the wood. It's not for looking at.   
  
The iron gates are open during the day, but a security officer stands to one side. At night they are locked, not to keep things in, but to keep people out. Nothing is sacred to the restless youths of today. The only still youngsters are the ones inside these walls.  
  
I walk through, reading the names on the stones. All of them are children. It must have seemed like a good idea, a cemetery only for children, but it isn't. It fills this place with despair and depression. Even the stone angels seem like they are crying, and it isn't just because they are carved like that.   
  
In the distance a mass of black, and the faint sounds of weeping. Another death, and other wooden box into the ground to rot away to nothingness.   
  
I walk down a grassy hill. At the bottom I turn left, and three stones down I stop. The daffodils I left last time I found the courage to come down here are dead. The brown petals have blown away, and the stems are left, limp and withering. I clear them, and wish I'd brought some to replace them.   
  
--  
  
The day passes as a dream. She goes shopping, what she imagines is an acceptable activity. She walks around the shops, but not looking at the clothes. She watches the people, the mothers, the children, the babies.   
  
In the bookstore she runs into a woman looking through all the expecting books, juggling books of advice and caution, books saying what to eat, books saying what to do, how to sleep, or how to educate your baby before it's born.   
  
She thinks of the books at her house, worn through, but now useless.   
  
She buys a pair of pink socks, a suitable trophy for the wasted morning.   
  
In the afternoon she prepares the dinner, then finds herself with nothing to do. Maybe she should get a job, something to occupy these long hours. Maybe.   
  
She sits on the deck, wrapped in a blanket, watching the lake.   
  
--   
  
He arrives home late, to find her asleep on the deck. Though he should wake her, he chooses to watch her for a minute.   
  
She's so beautiful. How could he even think to hurt her? He shakes her shoulder and she looks up, and it's the old smile, the old chemistry.  
  
"Sweetie? How long have you been out here?"   
  
Inside the dinner is ruined.   
  



End file.
